The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-08-16
EADS SHIP RAILWAY.
The Company WIN Ask No Aid from Congress
"A Great Work.

The Company Will Ask No Aid from Congress
"A Great Work
| New Orleans Times Democrat.
| The Eads Ship Railway Company organized
| Saturday with the following directors: Ex-
| Senator William Window. Col. James Andrews,
| William Shaw, vice-president of the Pe1nsyl-
vania railroad; Charles Locknart. p S. Rols,
John B. McDougald and D. L. Corthel In
about twenty days the company will have q
Ship Transit Company, under the laws of New
York, which will begin the construction OF Capt.
Eadss ship railway from the Gulf of Mexico to
the Pacific Ocean without delay
The company will ask aid or assistance
from Congress. It is backed by men of great
wealth who have every confidence in it, and who
will contribute all the money necessary to carry
1t through to success.
Here is the only remaining chance Of con-
structing that great transisthmian route which
is the hope and demand of commerce The
growing trade between the Atlantic and Pacific
will no longer be defed by this narrow strip of
land separating the two oceans, and demands
the building of the ship railway. The Panama
canal has proved an expensive failure, has swal-
lowed up hundreds OF millions, until even the
French. with all their confidence in la grand
Francois. have declined to put up any more
money it. AS for the Ncarasuan scheme, it
has never had any bottom It has lived for half
century doing naueht but making absurd esti-
mates of the cost of the work, estimates several
hundred per cent of from the true figures.
There remains only the Eads ship rail way to
which the world looks to accomplish this great
engineering feat-an6 it and will. 1t does
not depend on subsidy from the government
like the Nicaragua scheme nor will it cost the
hundreds of millions that have exhausted the
pockets and the patience of the French people
with the Panama route Its plans. even to the
minutest details, have been arranged, and it has
at its head men in whom every confidence can be
placed, who areespecially fitted FOR the work and
well backed financially for it. Colonel Andrews,
who will probably be the manager of the COM
pany, has been the co-laborer of Captain
Eads In all his great engineering enterprises-in
the ST. Louis bridge in the ietties. and other
works-and he is specially fitted to carry
through to completion and success this great
terprise, having fully mastered it.
All the details were fortunately arranged be-
tween Captain Eads and Colonel Andrews be-
fore the death of the former. There is nothing
to be done save carry out the work already
planned and perfected. Just Colonel An
drews was the executive through whom Captain
Eads's plans for the jetties were carried out, SO
in the present case he will complete the design
of the great engineer. and erect to his memory
the grandest piece of modern engineering-a
ship railway across the sthmus.
The United States has vital interest IN this
and New Orleans even greater one. There IS
no brighter ray of hope in the future than the
completion OF this ship railway, that will
make New Orleans the nearest port OF the Gulf.
the Mississippi valley. and the Atlantic to the
Pacific ocean. the hundreds of millions people
on its shores, and billions of dollars of trade
in it's bosom.